


not very good at this

by nanatsuyu



Category: All For The Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: Diet Angst, Fluff, Gen, Happy Jean Moreau, Neil Josten & Jean Moreau Friendship, Past Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Sassy Neil Josten, Soft Neil Josten, Wholesome Twinyards, andrew isn't around for this fic but its because, i dont know any french im sorry, implied Kandreil, kevin gets sober and his boyfriends help, they hang out now that time has passed ill die on that hill
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-25
Updated: 2020-12-25
Packaged: 2021-03-11 05:47:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28309962
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nanatsuyu/pseuds/nanatsuyu
Summary: “He seems brighter,” Neil said absentmindedly, tracing the queen piece.“I imagine it’s hard to live with Knox and not absorb a little bit of that attitude.” Glaring amount of sunshine would have been more apt, but Kevin wasn’t a poet and he had no intention of mincing words now.Neil hummed, suddenly scarce of any teasing words. “I’m glad.”
Relationships: Jeremy Knox/Jean Moreau, Kevin Day & Jean Moreau, Kevin Day/Neil Josten, Neil Josten & Jean Moreau
Comments: 12
Kudos: 65





	not very good at this

**Author's Note:**

> I'll be late to my own funeral but here's a little "in the future when they're all healing and a little happier" fic for my beloved Gull's birthday <3 Love you birb. Hope you like it!
> 
> (no beta we die like men and let our usual beta judge us later)

"He says you're doing it wrong."

"Of course he does," Kevin said with an eyeroll. He glanced up from the stove to watch Neil lean back onto the cupboards, comfortable in his self made spot on the counter. His phone call with Jean was running longer than expected considering the man was coming over in—Kevin checked the clock on the wall—less than an hour. "He should hurry up if he thinks he can do any better. If he has time to run his mouth, he has time to do this himself."

Neil mimed Kevin in an uncomfortably accurate caricature, breaking character to smile as he relayed Jean's reply, "He says there's another call on the line: all of France is begging you not to betray them like this."

He was making dinner, not starting a revolution. Though, the mere idea of anyone cooking a French dish might as well have been a declaration of war for Jean. _Picky bastard._

" _All of France can blow me_ ," Kevin replied in French, pushing at Neil's cheek so he could get in the cabinet behind him. He pulled out a couple jars of spices, before pulling Neil back into place. Kevin avoided the smile that was still pulling at Neil's lips. He couldn't be blamed for what might happen if he looked at it for too long.

"Kevin says you can blow him," Neil said into the phone, purposely butchering the translation and nudging his foot into Kevin’s thigh like it was the most amusing thing in the world. 

The long pause heard on Jean’s side was mutual and Kevin stared at the backsplash wondering which decision in particular set him on the path to this exact moment in his life. He wouldn't change it of course, but a part of him wished he would have checked Neil a little harder in practice at _least_ once.

Said nuisance went back to his conversation, occasionally shifting around to let Kevin grab what he needed. His skill with knives had come in handy earlier, but now he seemed content to watch Kevin do all the heavy lifting. Neil wasn’t much for cooking—Kevin wasn’t either, but Andrew was out of town visiting Aaron, so they had to make due. The twins finally getting along well enough for voluntary visits meant more to him than a couple rough nights of fumbling around the kitchen. 

And fumble they did. 

Replacing one of the stovetop burners was going to have to happen in the next two days if they didn’t want to be on the receiving end of one of Andrew’s judging glares.

“You’re bringing Kevin, right?” Neil carded a hand through _his_ Kevin’s hair, brushing it back out of his eyes. The answer must have been yes because Neil’s eyes _twinkled_ and Kevin rolled his own. He didn’t mind the _other Kevin_ , but making a fuss about it was more entertaining than not. Andrew was rubbing off on him.

Neil slipped into French again for the rest of the call, occasionally snorting at whatever Jean was saying. Kevin wasn’t sure how the two had managed to smooth the rough edges between them, probably as well as Jean and Kevin himself had. But if nothing else, Neil was very good at getting underneath someone’s skin, in fondness or irritation. Some days he even managed both. 

It was strangely domestic, and that thought always caught Kevin off guard given he didn’t really know the phrase beyond cinematic depiction and the Foxes few shared dinners in college. Well, that was what he would have said years ago—living with Andrew and Neil had proved that even the biggest shoulder chips were capable of something close to happy. 

Kevin continued to watch the slow simmer on the stove top, his thoughts coming to their own simmer as he recalled just how long it took to get here. The hang ups were countless and he was sure they all remembered each and every time the record skipped. And yet, here he was, making dinner in a place he could call home with a strange swell in his chest that he could conveniently pass off as heartburn if Neil wasn’t so good at reading other people.

The foot nudging at his thigh returned, and Kevin didn’t look away from the pot coming to a boil, but he looped his free hand around Neil’s ankle, thumbing lightly over the bone. 

“Jean says he’s going to stop by the ER,” Neil said plainly. 

Kevin gave him a bewildered look, question on his face before it hit his lips. 

“He wants to warn them to save some beds ready and that we’ll be on our way there after dinner.”

Oh, he _definitely_ should have checked _both_ of them into the court walls a lot harder. 

Kevin snatched up the phone, the sound of Jean’s laugh still ringing through the tinny speaker. He had been hearing it a lot more as of late. “ _Connard_.” 

Jean returned the sentiment with a few of his own colorful endearments.

“Are you on your way or not?” Kevin bit without any venom.

“I am,” the ghost of amusement resonating in Jean’s voice despite his cool tone. 

Kevin grunted into the phone, tossing it back to Neil and turning his attention back to the now almost overflowing pot. Distractions would inevitably burn the place down, he was sure. 

“Kevin’s attempting to boil us both alive.” Neil paused. “Well, I could do that, but we’d lose out on a portion of the rent.” 

Jean’s laugh rang through again and Kevin decided he didn’t want to know anymore.

Neil leaned back against the cupboards again, starting his goodbye when Jean interrupted him. Neil mulled something around in his head before he spoke again. “A sparkling juice instead, maybe? Thank you, though.”

_Oh._

Kevin went back to focusing on not _boiling them both alive_ only catching the last bits of conversation. He didn’t realize Neil was talking to him till he felt the trace of a finger along his cheek.

“He seems brighter,” Neil said absentmindedly, tracing the queen piece. Kevin leaned into the touch.

“I imagine it’s hard to live with Knox and _not_ absorb a little bit of that attitude.” _Glaring amount of sunshine_ would have been more apt, but Kevin wasn’t a poet and he had no intention of mincing words now. 

After a lot of push and pull—and a very drunk phone call from Jeremy himself—Kevin had finally convinced Jean that his long standing roommate from college _probably_ wanted a little more than the roommate title. Long time coming was better than a day late and a dollar short, though. The last few years were a slow progression of watching weight slide off Jean’s shoulders—in small amounts, of course, nothing drastic. Jean didn’t curl in on himself nearly as much, didn’t hold himself quite so timidly in conversation. The first time Kevin saw Jean sling his arm over the back of a chair, he stopped worrying so much about whether ‘being okay’ would ever be something Jean could do more than just imagine. Storm clouds like the ones over Jean didn’t clear up overnight, though. Kevin could relate: His smile still hadn’t committed itself to muscle memory.

Carefree would look good on them eventually.

Neil hummed, suddenly scarce of any teasing words. “I’m glad.” 

He tapped the tattoo once more before letting Kevin concentrate, the sounds of the kitchen filling the quiet.

A gentle knock at the door disrupted the scene some time later, Neil hopping off the counter to answer it. Kevin heard muffled conversation before a short pause and Neil’s question of: _Can I_? Then there was a flurry of tapping along the ground and the sound of Neil getting the wind knocked out of him. That should not sound so familiar to Kevin's ears.

Moments later, Neil came around the corner, voicing what Kevin already knew, “Jean’s here.” 

Kevin turned to see Jean hovering in the doorway, arms folded over his chest. 

“Jean.”

“Kevin.”

Kevin’s eyes slid down to Neil’s new object of affection, wagging it’s tail and waiting to be noticed. Jean would have never struck Kevin as someone who would be into dogs, let alone _large_ dogs, but here stood one of the biggest black labs Kevin had ever seen, its gentle wiggling barely containing it’s excitement as it stared up at him. 

Carefully moving a couple things back from the counter’s edge, Kevin stood with his hands on his hips as he regarded the dog again. “ _Kevin_.”

Neil thought the name was endearing. Kevin thought it was difficult.

(He also secretly adored _other Kevin_ , and the numerous Polaroids on their fridge of the black lab curled up on Kevin on the couch proved that).

He patted his chest finally and _other_ _Kevin_ turned into a live spring, jumping up into his arms with all of the grace ninety pounds of fur could offer. Years of training in the gym had clearly only come in handy for being able to carefully lift said dog and not drop him every single time Jean brought him over. It wasn’t a terrible use of muscle mass he supposed. 

“He’s gotten bigger,” Kevin mumbled into the mess of fur, turning sideways to see Jean had moved to inspect his cooking. “Neil can you—” 

Neil didn’t need to be told twice. He took _other Kevin_ from his arms, the dog nearly dwarfing him in size. Kevin thought this was also amusing, but didn’t voice it for the moment, Jean’s voice cutting through his thoughts.

“Doesn’t look like it’ll be my last meal.”

“Unfortunate for both of us, I guess,” Kevin leaned back against the counter, watching Neil move to entertain the dog in the other room. “How’ve you been?” 

“I have been alright,” Jean said casually and for once Kevin believed him. Jean dropped his bags off on the counter, pulling out whatever else Neil had told him to grab on the way over. The bottle stared back at him as Jean moved to toss the bags away. “And you?”

“Can’t complain,” and for once Kevin believed _himself_. 

Kevin and Jean still didn’t really know how to _talk—_ they could converse and share space obviously—but _talking_ was still sometimes a lump in the throat neither of them were willing to swallow down. But Neil, for all his ability to rile people, had acted as a balm for the two, encouraging when either of them would have preferred to bury the hatchet in themselves first. Given that the first few meetings had ended in clenched fists and ticked jaws, stilted conversation was an upgrade. That was more than Kevin could have hoped for.

Jean picked up the bottle, gesturing to it before propping it in the fridge. “Neil said you would prefer this.”

Kevin silently made a mental note to thank Neil for everything he had never voiced aloud. “Yeah. It’s been awhile.”

A year wasn’t much, and it felt far longer, but the sentiment was appreciated. The fact that it was even asked about meant it had been discussed and that turned something in Kevin’s stomach. It wasn't a secret, but it wasn't a truth he was very proud of either.

He watched Jean pause as he closed the fridge, eyeing the notes and photographs that overlapped each other across the front: postcards from Nicky, photos from Matt and Dan’s wedding, drawings by Aaron’s kids. It wasn’t quite the old Fox wall, but with the way it was growing, it was well on its way.

Jean focused on a Polaroid towards the center, and tapped it with his knuckle. “Neil’s become quite the photographer.”

Kevin eyed the picture, a point in time caught from a year or so ago. Jean was sitting on a bench watching a blurry Kevin and _other Kevin_ out in the far field of a park. It had been one of the nicer days—an _easier_ one. 

He didn’t like photoshoots. They felt manicured in every sense of the word; nothing unfixed and nothing out of place. This didn’t feel like that, though. It was just a snapshot in their lives, barely capturing anything more than a fleeting second of something like a drop of joy in an ocean storm. It was fitting, but he hoped a few pictures more would fill the remaining spots on the fridge sooner rather than later.

“He’s not bad—”

“ _If you guys have time to run your mouths, you have time to finish dinner_ ,” Neil said once again with scary accuracy, rounding the corner with the fuzzier Kevin in tow. He started in on getting the plates and Jean wandered back over to the dish he and Neil had started earlier. Neil must have sensed the incoming judgement, “We’re not very good at this, but I’ll let France know we gave it our best.” 

Jean didn’t comment but Kevin saw the corner of his mouth twitch as he grabbed down a couple glasses Neil couldn’t reach. 

“And I’ll be sure to let them know you allowed it,” Kevin added.

Jean sighed. “I’ll be sure they keep the guillotine blade sharp.”

“How generous of you,” Neil poked back.

_Other Kevin_ let out a small bark for attention and Kevin himself supposed he could take over indulging him for a minute. He did all the heavy lifting earlier after all. As he ushered the ball of fur out into the living room, the soft sound of casual French trickled out of the kitchen. It was becoming a sort of comfort—familiar. The occasional laugh even more so. 

Neil was right again: They weren’t very good at this. 

But they could be eventually.

**Author's Note:**

> Gull had this lovely hc that Jean has an adorable service dog he named Kevin because he "misses having a Kevin around" and I actually died. 
> 
> <3


End file.
